[Deck] Dredge

[Svyelunite]

#dredgeisalifestyle

Well done, Que.

Hah, beat me to posting it

Agreed, thanks again to Que for doing the interview with me.

[meffeo]

Hah, beat me to posting it

Agreed, thanks again to Que for doing the interview with me.

Cheers man! I really appreciate the work you are doing on the channel.

/ot


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk.

[mistercakes]

thanks for not sharing all the secrets on how to beat dredge :D :D

[Que]

thanks for not sharing all the secrets on how to beat dredge :D :D

Haha thanks guys. Yeah I was thinking about that, but that wasn't really one of the questions really. If anything this interview has kind of given me an idea. I figure I can also record some small snippets with regards to side boarding, gameplay or interactions you might have with other decks, etc.. that I can put on youtube. That might be something useful. Or perhaps answer specific questions idk yet.

Also there was some stuff cut from the interview for time reasons, but I want to make sure I got to post it on here. I gave shout outs to people from whom I learned a great deal by emulating and studying their material; whether it be their articles, their gameplay on camera, their discussions, and/or their tournament reports. They included:

Erik Hegemann, Timo Schunemann, Jason Bulkowski, Dave Thomas, Damon Whitby, Michael Keller, Ando Ferguson, Richard Feldman, MaxMcall, Drew Tunison

Thanks and big ups to these guys!


#Westcoast

[vieko]

Haha thanks guys.

QUE... Cañon! Well done man, if you decide to post / record snippets and need a hand setting up, drop me a line.

[Sygmad]

Hey guys I have a question about Keep or mull :

We're game 1 against an unknow opponent and we're on the play, do you keep this hand:

Stinkweed imp
Careful study
Dread return
Mana confluence
Bridge from below
Golgari grave-Troll
Lotus petal

And if you keep, how do you play it ?

And if you know you're against ANT, what is your choice ?

I have another question, Imagine you have a hand With land, dredger, careful ,cabal therapy and the other cards are useless in your hand (like Bridge or ichorid)

Against an unknown deck OTP, do you Cabal yourself ?
If you know the opposing deck, against which type do you cabal the opponent, cabal you or Craeful t1

Thanks !

[mistercakes]

Hey guys I have a question about Keep or mull :

We're game 1 against an unknow opponent and we're on the play, do you keep this hand:

Stinkweed imp
Careful study
Dread return
Mana confluence
Bridge from below
Golgari grave-Troll
Lotus petal

And if you keep, how do you play it ?

And if you know you're against ANT, what is your choice ?

I have another question, Imagine you have a hand With land, dredger, careful ,cabal therapy and the other cards are useless in your hand (like Bridge or ichorid)

Against an unknown deck OTP, do you Cabal yourself ?
If you know the opposing deck, against which type do you cabal the opponent, cabal you or Craeful t1

Thanks !

i think that's a pretty easy keep. t1 careful and you gotta see what you draw from there. i'm not too sure vs ANT if you can mulligan reliably into a better hand. ANT is fast, and you have a lot of disruption available. if you draw breakthrough or even looting off of the careful study you've probably won the game.

cabal therapy is stronger vs the opponent than vs yourself most of the time.

if it's game 1, i would study first. if it's g2/3 and they have hate, on the draw i would cabal, on the play only if they have cage. i can see an argument for playing on t1 if you are really afraid of rest in peace or priest.

[SHABOOGS]

Game 1 against an unknown opponent I would keep that hand and play land into careful study. If that resolves, then my next move will depend on what 2 cards I get from study. If I have a hand with therapy on the play against an unknown opponent I would usually therapy the opponent naming force of will.

[draugr]

Hey folks,

I already own a playset of LEDs, so this isn't for budget reasons. I've been double thinking the role of LED in G1 and have been wanting to maindeck Lotus Petal in it's place. I like the acceleration Lotus Petal provides without having to go "all-in" like LED, and being able to get out a discard outlet going + draw spell in the same turn is huge. Moreover, it provides extra mana to get around Daze and Thorn. Can you folks explain to me why I'm wrong in my views of LED? Note, I'm still keeping it in the SB for when we need to go all in against other combo and reanimator.

For reference, here's my list: Dredge

[Ronald Deuce]

Dredge

Feels a bit like turning a rocket-car into a Volvo, tbh. You're losing the power and goes-fast for a moderate increase in consistency and resilience, which I don't think is worth it.

You might have a slightly better long game with that sort of strategy, but I feel like not running a full set of LED and Coliseum is putting pressure on you to run alternate discard outlets (like PImp) that aren't really necessary and don't have as much power. You'll also be a lot less likely to flash back a Faithless Looting without Lotuses in the deck.

Another big advantage to running LED is that it makes it a lot easier to overwhelm a Deathrite Shaman, and not only when you've got a Faithless to recur.

Hope I'm not being too harsh! I think we have different philosophies about how to build and play the deck; I'm on 12 lands (4 Coliseums), maindeck 2x Dread Return and G-Brand, and 2 Wraiths instead of 3 PImps. I tried out Lotus Petals for a while in the sideboard, and though I can see the theoretical use for them, I didn't find that they came up enough to give me an idea of how helpful they would really be in a tournament. There weren't many instances in which I found myself hurting for a Petal when another card would do just as well, and when the Eldrazi rolled around I stopped taking for granted the ability to play spells on 0 or 1. I like your running 4x Ichorid; I don't feel any desire to go back to 3, especially in the newly Chalice-filled format. Icky's just so good for so many things.

If you're running 4 Petals in your main, I would definitely (DEFINITELY) run Abrupt Decay in your sideboard. You'd have 14 mana sources for it, which is 1.75 times as many as I'm running. I abandoned Decay for a lack of fixing, but I very much doubt you'll have that problem with the Petals.

[Sygmad]

Hey !

IN GP Columbus Brandon Price placed 31st with a cool dredge list ! Here it is :

4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Street Wraith
2 Putrid Imp
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Narcomoeba
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough
1 Dread Return
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Careful Study
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Bridge from Below
2 Cephalid Coliseum
2 City of Brass
4 Mana Confluence
4 Gemstone Mine

Sideboard:

1 Dread Return
1 City of Brass
1 Darkblast
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Firestorm
3 Leyline of the Void
3 Nature's Claim

There is a few things that differs from a classic dredge list :

-inclusion of Pimp and Street Wraith
-only 2 Coliseum
-down to 3 careful strudy (maybe due to wraith's inclusion)
-Flame Kin zealot MD as the DR target !

And as always the Sideboard is customized

Any thoughts on this particular decklist ?

[mistercakes]

Hey !

IN GP Columbus Brandon Price placed 31st with a cool dredge list ! Here it is :

4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Street Wraith
2 Putrid Imp
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Narcomoeba
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough
1 Dread Return
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Careful Study
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Bridge from Below
2 Cephalid Coliseum
2 City of Brass
4 Mana Confluence
4 Gemstone Mine

Sideboard:

1 Dread Return
1 City of Brass
1 Darkblast
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Firestorm
3 Leyline of the Void
3 Nature's Claim

There is a few things that differs from a classic dredge list :

-inclusion of Pimp and Street Wraith
-only 2 Coliseum
-down to 3 careful strudy (maybe due to wraith's inclusion)
-Flame Kin zealot MD as the DR target !

And as always the Sideboard is customized

Any thoughts on this particular decklist ?

i'm guessing the 2 coliseum is to help out the sb, as there's even another city of brass in the sb. (casting darkblast twice in a turn or abrupt decay should be a bit easier)

[slave]

I already own a playset of LEDs, so this isn't for budget reasons. I've been double thinking the role of LED in G1 and have been wanting to maindeck Lotus Petal in it's place. I like the acceleration Lotus Petal provides without having to go "all-in" like LED, and being able to get out a discard outlet going + draw spell in the same turn is huge. Moreover, it provides extra mana to get around Daze and Thorn. Can you folks explain to me why I'm wrong in my views of LED? Note, I'm still keeping it in the SB for when we need to go all in against other combo and reanimator.

For reference, here's my list: Dredge

We don't need that much mana in the main. That said, I don't think including Petals in a mainlist is necessarily a bad move.

I tried Petals in the main for a while, but went back to a plain ol' 9 rainbows, 4 Coliseums & 4 LED's.
For me, Lotus Petal has some con's worth considering. The biggest, is that it's a spell, not a land.
It can be countered, and targeted by discard. Anything like Chalice of the Void @ 0, Thalia, Thorn etc. stops you playing it unless you also have a rainbow in hand. And of course it's a one-shot deal. I deemed those reasons enough to use rainbows instead in the main.

Given Dredge is already a fast deck in G1, I suspect the extra speed that LED provides isn't necessary unless your meta is chock full of Storm combo.

Hey !

IN GP Columbus Brandon Price placed 31st with a cool dredge list !
.....
There is a few things that differs from a classic dredge list :
-inclusion of Pimp and Street Wraith
-only 2 Coliseum
-down to 3 careful strudy (maybe due to wraith's inclusion)
-Flame Kin zealot MD as the DR target !
.....
Any thoughts on this particular decklist ?

Pimp & Wraith are a preference for me. Quite a few of us have been running a mix of these two for a while. I think most agree that both have pro's and con's worth your attention. I ran Wraith exclusively for a while, both for a while, but I'm now back to playing Pimp only. Full circle.
I don't know why Brandon Price was running 2x Coliseum, this isn't something I would expect to see unless our player in question was short of a few cards on the day.
3 Studies I can understand, however I think it's a auto 4-of myself.
FKZ is preference. I think we have better options for a DR target (Griselbrand, Iona, Ashen Rider, Flayer etc.) if we're looking to run a maindeck reanimation target.


The 2 Coliseums reminds me of a couple years back.
I'd been running a Griselbrand combo-version of dredge, and I turned up to play without checking my deck.
I turned up with a 58 card deck, as the G-man x2 had disappeared. I can only assume where they went, as they never turned up....
So being incredibly short of both money and time, I simply chucked a couple islands in my sideboard that the shop-dude donated for me, and popped a couple of my sideboard cards into the main.
After that day, which went well, it dawned on me that a reanimation target wasn't required for LED dredge to win reliably.....

[jimmythegreek]

Hey !

IN GP Columbus Brandon Price placed 31st with a cool dredge list ! Here it is :

4 Stinkweed Imp
3 Street Wraith
2 Putrid Imp
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Narcomoeba
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Golgari Thug
4 Ichorid
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough
1 Dread Return
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Careful Study
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Bridge from Below
2 Cephalid Coliseum
2 City of Brass
4 Mana Confluence
4 Gemstone Mine

Sideboard:

1 Dread Return
1 City of Brass
1 Darkblast
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Firestorm
3 Leyline of the Void
3 Nature's Claim

There is a few things that differs from a classic dredge list :

-inclusion of Pimp and Street Wraith
-only 2 Coliseum
-down to 3 careful strudy (maybe due to wraith's inclusion)
-Flame Kin zealot MD as the DR target !

And as always the Sideboard is customized

Any thoughts on this particular decklist ?

List seems sub-optimal eschewing the careful studies yet including reanimation and targets, seems quite inconsistent. I'm not the sharpest player (not assuming this players skill, I don't know this person) but I've won a 70 man tournament with dredge because the deck ran hot and I saw next to no hate. I'd be interested to hear more from this player.

[Michael Keller]

Haha thanks guys. Yeah I was thinking about that, but that wasn't really one of the questions really. If anything this interview has kind of given me an idea. I figure I can also record some small snippets with regards to side boarding, gameplay or interactions you might have with other decks, etc.. that I can put on youtube. That might be something useful. Or perhaps answer specific questions idk yet.

Also there was some stuff cut from the interview for time reasons, but I want to make sure I got to post it on here. I gave shout outs to people from whom I learned a great deal by emulating and studying their material; whether it be their articles, their gameplay on camera, their discussions, and/or their tournament reports. They included:

Erik Hegemann, Timo Schunemann, Jason Bulkowski, Dave Thomas, Damon Whitby, Michael Keller, Ando Ferguson, Richard Feldman, MaxMcall, Drew Tunison

Thanks and big ups to these guys!


#Westcoast

Excellent video and interview - great job, and thanks for the shout-out!

I'll be playing Dredge for the first time in a year and a half this weekend on the East Coast at Eternal Extravaganza 4 in PA. I'll be sure to keep you guys in the loop.

[Noctalor]

That list is pretty similar to what i would be playing right know.
This is my list at the moment

4 Lion's Eye Diamond
3 Golgari Thug
4 Golgari Grave-Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Faithless Looting
3 Breakthrough
2 Putrid Imp
3 Ichorid
4 Narcomoeba
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Mana Confluence
4 Gemstone Mine
4 Cephalid Coliseum
3 Careful Study
4 Bridge from Below
2 City of Brass
4 Prized Amalgam
SB: 4 Firestorm
SB: 4 Nature's Claim
SB: 1 Wispmare
SB: 1 Ingot Chewer
SB: 1 Dread Return
SB: 1 Pithing Needle
SB: 3 Lotus Petal

Im still not 100% satisfied with it, i would like to play with a maindeck dread return and a single target, metagame goes faster and faster and we often need to go big before our opponent untaps.
I am sure that prized amalgam is a 4x in dredge, not playing it is as bad as not playing ichorids, the card is able to hard carry most mu and has never been bad in my tests, entering in eot is also good in some mu such as miracle, you can easily force a combat terminus and have your amalgams enter after it, and that's really game changing.

Im playing 14 lands in that list, not 100% sure it's correct, my plan is to decrease mulligans, I've also decided to play a bit more starters so i swapped a careful study for 2 imps, i think we cant afford to mull as easily as we used to, eldrazi can outrace us if we keep slow hands.

In the board we have 4 firestorms against the insane amount of dreathrite shamans (and this should mean that we need street wraiths, but i really have no more room in the deck), 4 claims as a general answer, the single dread return with no big targets can still reanimate our 2 problem solvers, ingot and wispmare, so is use is more like a single lock piece solver, and both wispmare and ingot are useful in most sideboard plans anyway, if we want to be a little more safe against lock maybe one of them can rotate out for an ashen rider.

Thoughts about my list?
I would like to hear what you think mainly about the amalgams

[slave]

This is my list at the moment

-1 Golgari Thug, -1 Breakthrough, -1 Putrid Imp or Icky, -1 Careful Study
+4 Prized Amalgam

I would like to hear what you think mainly about the amalgams

It seems you've shaved your numbers above to fit in Prized Amalgam.
Have you tried running it competitively yet? If so, how did it go?
Can you give us instances where PA is a good card to see against fast opponents? (think combo, storm etc.)

I've tried to like to card, tested it a fair bit, but whilst the card fits into Manaless pretty easily, I'm yet to be convinced here in LED-dredge.
My main issue, other than the *tapped* part, is that Pimp & Icky help to power Therapy & Dread Return, whereas PA is slow, so I can't make zombies until my next turn.
Against any decks that can nuke your bridges, this isn't something that sits well with me.

[Noctalor]

It seems you've shaved your numbers above to fit in Prized Amalgam.
Have you tried running it competitively yet? If so, how did it go?
Can you give us instances where PA is a good card to see against fast opponents? (think combo, storm etc.)

I've tried to like to card, tested it a fair bit, but whilst the card fits into Manaless pretty easily, I'm yet to be convinced here in LED-dredge.
My main issue, other than the *tapped* part, is that Pimp & Icky help to power Therapy & Dread Return, whereas PA is slow, so I can't make zombies until my next turn.
Against any decks that can nuke your bridges, this isn't something that sits well with me.

Amalgam has been on Narco level since i started testing it, so i'd say its hella broken.

The card is amazing in any grindy MU, you get way more strong dredges than before, hitting and early amalgam followed by a meba or ico is amazing.

You get much more play if your bridges get extracted, a fast beatdown with amalgams and ichorids is often enough to carry the game.

Amalgam is only bad against fast MU basicly, you can feel confidant boarding out them against combos.

Im still not 100% about the sideboard, but i feel like amalgam has become a standard 4x already.

[Que]

No Dread Return with Prized Amalgam? Isn't that the point of playing another recursive creature? otherwise you're just a beatdown deck. I mean why not play Nether Shadow or even Ashen Ghoul at that point. Though If I were to play your list I would cut the 2 Putrid Imp and add back the Careful Study and at least 1 Dread Return. Try that and let me know how you like it. I haven't personally played with the card, but that sounds like a better configuration for what I think you're trying to achieve. I might even cut the 14th land and put in the 12th dredger. 13 lands in my experience has been fine (9 rainbow lands); I'm currently using 4x Mana Confluence, 4x Cephalid Coliseum, 3x Gemstone Mine, 2x City of Brass Eric Copenhaver's manabase. Plus you still have the 3 Lotus Petal out of the board.

Also your sb looks a bit weak more specifically against combo. 1 Ingot and 1 Wispmare means you' wont draw them reliably. And you will not be Dread Returning these to answer cards like Cage and RIP Obviously... I would rather have targets for fast MU as you've mentioned those are the problem areas and you have no Iona, Flayer/Flame Kin, Griselbrand, Ashen Rider, etc.. to deal with those decks. You should be ok with Nature's Claim though I feel less impressed with it considering the abundance of Chalice floating around right now. I would rather play Abrupt Decay again even though you will not be able to answer Leyline of the Void (1 card that sees niche play). I'll hold my tongue on Firestorm as I've already expressed my thoughts on that card. /

Also I got to split the Finals recently at my LGS Knighware Inc, Running my usual list with Abrupts back in my sideboard. They were a huge help all day helping me clear DRS and Cages.

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...25-Trop-Tundra

Happy Dredging Y'all!

[SHABOOGS]

Congrats on the finish, Que. Any chance for a tournament report?